The invention relates to a transport device for carrying products with a displaceable carrying surface, comprising: a conveyor belt, a frame provided with a belt guide for holding the conveyor belt displaceably, and a drive for displacing the conveyor belt. The invention also relates to a method for allowing a conveyor belt to connect to other devices.
Transport devices, and more particularly belt conveyors applied in the food processing industry, are usually provided with adjusting means with which they can be adjusted in height and set level. This type of adjusting means is usually incorporated in the legs/the frame of a transport device. It is otherwise noted here that these are often also processing devices of which the transport device forms part. It is for instance possible here to envisage shaping devices, sprinkling equipment, drying equipment, heating devices such as ovens, cutting devices and so on; the food products undergo a determined process herein but are meanwhile displaced through the processing station by a belt conveyor and finally transferred to a subsequent station. By adjusting the legs of a transport device (of which one or more processing stations optionally also form part) it can be placed horizontally on a ground surface which is usually deliberately not given a horizontal form so as to thus enable a good connection to other devices. It is thus possible in the food processing industry to apply floors which have an incline of up to 5%, this in order to enable good drainage. Using the adjustment adjacent transport devices can be placed at the same angle (usually level) in order to thus facilitate the transfer of products. The adjustment in/of the legs is further usually applied so as to ensure that the transport device is at the correct height, likewise to facilitate receiving (picking up) and/or delivery (transfer) of the products. This is particularly desirable if the products for transferring are fragile. The drawback of the existing adjusting means of transport devices is that they have to take a heavy and therefore expensive form because they must be able to support substantially the whole transport device (optionally including associated processing stations). An additional drawback is that such prior art adjusting means are usually difficult to operate, partly as a result of the heavy construction and the considerable loading thereof. The result hereof is that a less good arrangement of the transport device is also accepted in practice because difficult adjustment work is thereby avoided and because a precise adjustment is difficult, if not impossible.